Disclaimer: I own Nothing.
Just a little experiment in writing self contained stories. Since I tend to have trouble writing stories that don't become huge epic things.
It was late September in the English countryside. Today it was bright and sunny and warm, quite a change from the previous days cold and rainy demeanor. Harry Potter glanced around their campsite, ward upon hastily thrown upward protecting them from the ever searching eyes of the Death Eaters and their Dark Lord. Hermione and Ron were still asleep inside their tent, he had woken up first.
After some debate. He had decided to leave the locket hanging from a chair. As well as a note written on spare parchment telling them that he was going into the nearby town to find food. They really should have packed some food, non perishable things, just in case. But they hadn't expected to be forced on the run after infiltrating the ministry.
Harry shook his head ruefully. They hadn't prepared for every situation. He double checked that he had everything he needed. Wand, check, Money, check, Invisibility Cloak, check, backpack, check, and that was everything. The young wizard headed out, enjoying the feel of the sun on his face and jumping every time a twig snapped under his own foot. He paused, shuddering, an unfamiliar tingling sensation swept over him as he passed the boundaries of the wards. Such heavy magical protections were unusual for him to feel outside of Hogwarts.
He continued on his way. They were camped near a large seaside town, practically a small city. They had camped here because Hermione had said that she had always wanted to see the ocean. They were trying to make the best of a bad situation. Harry wondered if they should do a little sightseeing, and maybe just relax a little, just for today.
He soon crossed the boundaries of the small grove of trees they had found to hide their campsite. He came across a sight that he hadn't been expecting, a beautiful seaside view; a cliff with rocks overlooking the ocean beyond. The ocean waves roaring like the lions that represented his Hogwarts house, glittering and shining in the sunlight as majestically as a lion bounding after its prey. It was breathtaking.
But that wasn't what captured his attention. His attention was drawn to the person standing on one of the rocks.
It was another teenager, maybe a year older than Harry himself. He had brown hair with an odd orange splotch at the top, and was wearing a bright red jacket. Despite having brown eyes, the boy looked to be of vaguely Asian descent, he was also clearly muggle. He stood near the edge of the rock, staring out at the ocean with a faraway look in his eyes. The stranger didn't seem to notice Harry at all. Suddenly the other teen seemed to come back to earth, tilting his head to the side as if listening to someone.
The stranger turned towards him, curious at first, before a goofy grin spread across his face. "Hey stranger, what brings you here so early?" The other teen jumped down from the rock, his eyes trained on Harry. The Gryffindor frowned, noticing that despite the warm and cheerful demeanor, there was something in the stranger's eyes that seemed cautious and suspicious of him. "Great view huh? The Ocean is the same no matter where you go." The stranger continued the far off look returning. Harry noted that he appeared to be reminiscing.
"I wouldn't know." Harry admitted. There was no harm in speaking to a muggle. Who knows, maybe he could give him directions. He wasn't entirely sure where the nearest grocery store was. "This is the first time I've ever seen it." It was beautiful though, the Great Lake back at Hogwarts didn't even compare to this. His heart clenched at the thought of Hogwarts. It felt so wrong to not be there, Hogwarts had been his home for the last seven years. And here he was, on the run from a Voldemort run ministry instead of there with his friends.
The stranger grinned at him. "You're in luck then! There's nothing more awesome than the ocean on a sunny day. So, are you camping or something?" The stranger asked curiously. There was something carefree and unidentifiable about the other teen. Something that made it seem as though the entire world was either his friend, or his enemy. The stranger certainly seemed to think that they were friends at the moment. He found himself answering the strangers question before he had time to really think about it.
"You could say that. My friends and I didn't pack quite enough food though. You wouldn't happen to know where the nearest store is, would you." Harry asked, deciding that the stranger wasn't a threat. And if he was, he was of the legal age to do magic. He was pretty sure he could defend himself from a muggle.
The stranger cocked his head to the side in thought, as if listening to the warm wind blowing dead leaves around them. Harry had to wonder what he was thinking about; it wasn't often that he met someone who was quite as interesting as the older teen appeared to be.
"Yeah, I passed it on my way here. I'm Jaden Yuki by the way, nice to meet you." The stranger introduced himself cheerfully, extending his hand for Harry to shake. The Gryffindor accepted it and they shook.
Harry smiled back; Jaden's good mood appeared to be infectious. "I'm Harry Potter." He was relieved when there was no spark of recognition in the other teen's eyes. There was no way this guy was magical if he didn't know who he was. Even though it was a bit egotistical, it was true. Every wizard or witch he had ever met knew who he was, the only person in existence to have survived the killing curse. "So about that store . . ." As interesting as this little meeting was, his friends would be waking up soon. If he wasn't back before they started worrying, there might be a couple of problems.
Jaden blinked. "Oh right, right. C'mon, I'll show you the way. It's not that far." He said, motioning for Harry to follow. "Though I'm more of a fast food kind of guy, hey there's an idea! Let's go get a burger or something. This place is dead for dueling anyway." Harry had no idea what Jaden was talking about. Either the other teen liked to ramble, or simply liked hearing the sound of his voice. Either way, it was a nice change from the uncomfortable, tense silence that usually overcame him and his friends.
"Dueling?" Harry asked, raising an eyebrow. He had heard Dudley mention it a few times. He assumed it was some kind of muggle sport. He walked side by side with the older teen. "What's that?" Maybe he could find out more about it. Dudley always made it sound so interesting. He wondered if it had something to do with the old cards he had found in Dudley's second bedroom once. He had taken them with him when he left. He didn't know why, sentimental value he supposed. Jaden froze, had he said something wrong?
"You, don't know, what Dueling is?" Jaden was horrified, as if Harry had just said he didn't know who Dumbledore was. "Boy, have I got a lot to tell you. I'll tell ya all about it bro, it's only the most awesome thing ever!" Jaden looked a lot like Oliver Wood about to go on a Quidditch rant right now. Harry had to stop himself from groaning, what had he gotten himself into?
"And that's everything you need to know about Duel Monsters!" Almost two hours had passed since Jaden had promised to tell Harry 'all about' Dueling. They were right back where they started, Harry carrying a bag of nonperishable foods from the store. His mind was reeling; he didn't think that it was possible. But he had somehow found a game more complicated than Quidditch.
He wondered what was next, Hermione declaring war on the Purebloods. Maybe Ron would decide to take up ballet. He paused, wondering where those thoughts had even come from. It was probably just the shock talking. Who would have guessed that there was a worldwide sensation, and it was card games?
"Well, that was . . . educational." Harry said slowly, not entirely sure how to put the last two hours of non-stop card game ranting into words. "Well, thanks for showing me to the store. But, I better get back to my friends. They're probably wondering where I am anyway." The faster he got back to them, the faster they could get moving. They couldn't stay in one place too long. The Death Eaters might find them. They really couldn't afford that right now, or ever really.
"Hey, I'll come with; your friends sound like really cool guys!" Jaden said cheerfully. Harry blinked; he didn't remember telling Jaden about his friends. But now that he thought about it, there might have been some questions here and there throughout all the card game talk. He probably answered them absent mindedly, as he had been trying to tune out Jaden's borderline obsessive love of Duel Monsters. He wondered what he had said; hopefully it didn't compromise the statue of secrecy or anything. He had to remember not to space out in the future, especially when talking to other people.
Harry smiled apologetically. "I'll have to talk to them first. We're kind of cautious around people. Be right back." He called over his shoulder, running back towards the campsite and through the wards. He paused, shaking his head to clear away the still unfamiliar sensation of literally crossing through a barrier of magic. He had a lot to tell Ron and Hermione.
Jaden watched Harry vanish into thin air and blinked in surprise. "Where'd he go?" That was weird, since when could normal people vanish into thin air. There had to be something he was missing here. The question was what? It wasn't like he knew Harry enough to make a correct assumption on anything. Though, due to past experiences, he had to say that magic was involved. It almost always was after all. "Well, what do you think Yubel?" He turned to the side, sending a questioning look to the Duel Spirit beside him.
She hummed in thought, watching the spot Harry had vanished from with a trained eye. "Magic, very much different from that of the shadows, the light, or the darkness, it's weaker. More modern, more versatile, I can't quite place it." She responded apologetically. He smiled at her in amusement. Yubel absolutely hated not knowing things. Almost as much as she hated disappointing him.
"Well whatever kind of magic it is. It's not hostile. So that's a bonus." Jaden grinned cheerfully. He leaned against a nearby tree casually. "We'll just wait around here until Harry's talked to his buds. Then we can ask questions about it. Bet they'll be surprised we know about it!" Though he wouldn't introduce Yubel. In his experience, most people had very negative reactions to her. It probably had something to do with her appearance. Non-Duelists tended to flip out. But Duelists seemed more prepared to adapt to his and her situation. Likely a result of them being more used to monsters than the average person.
He'd sensed something off about Harry from the moment they'd met. Knowing that the other teen was magic. Made a lot more sense. But he hadn't even heard of Duel Monsters before. But luckily He was just the guy to explain it to Harry. He couldn't help but get the vibe that he and Harry were in a similar boat. Some grand cosmic scheme centered totally around them. It wasn't so much that he had a feeling, as it was the way Harry acted.
While they were hanging out, the younger teen had always been looking over his shoulder. Or jumping at loud noises. Like someone was after him or something. The vague answers he gave about his friends, and the fact that Harry was a very bad liar. It all added up to him being in a lot of trouble, a lot of the time. Jaden could relate to that. It reminded him a lot of his experiences back at Duel Academy. He could only hope that Harry didn't have it quite as bad as he did.
He tapped his foot impatiently. Jaden was starting to consider the option of just walking right up to the hidden campsite. It couldn't be that hard to walk right into a magically protected area. He didn't yet fully understand what his and Yubel's powers could do. But he was sure they could do that much. It didn't take that long to tell your friends about a stranger you just met and wanted to bring into your for some reason magically warded campsite. Or he assumed it didn't. He'd never had to magically hide a campsite before. That had been his friends, from him. But that was in the past and he really needed to try harder to repress those memories.
He sighed. Man was waiting boring. Then again he was on a schedule. He was supposed to be in Venice by now. Maybe he should just take off. Harry probably wouldn't mind. They'd just met, plus he tended to run into people more than once. So there was a high chance of them meeting up again sometime in the future. Point being, he had to get to venice before that jerk on the motorcycle with a dragon obsession made it to Zane.
Jesse had sent out an S.O.S a couple of days ago. Some jerk with a mask had made off with his Rainbow Dragon card. Jaden hated people who messed with his friends. Since the guy seemed to have a thing for dragons, and card jacking. He and Yubel were pretty sure that Zane was the next target. According to the news on the Duel-Forums online. The Red Eyes Black Dragon, and the three Blue Eyes White Dragons had been stolen too. Which made Zane's incredibly rare Cyber Dragons perfect targets. He'd called a head and warned the older duelist about the threat. But just in case Zane couldn't handle the mysterious thief. They were headed out to Venice anyway. Which was where they were holding the world championships this year.
Despite going there on "Business", he was excited to see the sights and take a look around once they caught the guy. If there was one thing Jaden loved about having graduated from Duel Academy, it was the traveling he was able to do. There was nothing quite like traveling all across the world and seeing how people dueled in different countries. It was exhilarating. To learn new strategies and face new opponents. Duel Monsters was the kind of game that translated into just about any language. Though he still found himself homesick for the island school. He made a mental note to arrange to visit the school once this whole 'masked guy stealing cards' thing got resolved.
He glanced back over towards where Harry had vanished. To his relief, the short teen was back in view of normal people. Plus he was motioning for Jaden to come over. At least that meant he wasn't going to get attacked or something by Harry's paranoid friends. He grinned and jogged over, passing through a barrier of magic, and Harry as he did. It was pretty heavy too. Which begged the question, how much magic was being used here? As well as, what kind of magic was there that wasn't related to Duel Monsters? All magic he'd encountered at this point had something to do with the game. This, definitely didn't have anything to do with Dueling.
Glancing around, he observed that their campsite had already been cleaned up and packed away. Which was strange, because there were no bags around. Did they just sleep on the ground or something? There was a bonfire pit, but considering this wasn't a legitimate campsite. It was probably made with magic. Since it was pretty professionally made. It looked like they were ready to up and bolt at the drop of a hat.
Curiously, Jaden turned back to Harry. "Just who are you guys?" He asked with a raised eyebrow. Only just now did it occur to him that he could have just walked into a dangerous situation. Luckily he always kept his duel disk on his arm, loaded and ready in case anything went wrong. "You're hidden under a big barrier of unidentifiable magic, you don't know what Dueling is, and you're super paranoid about new people." He ticked off the points on his fingers. "So, what's the deal?"
Even before he'd finished speaking they were pointing that he assumed were weapons at him. Shiny sticks that weren't very threatening on the surface. But the three of them were acting, it was obvious that they were very, very dangerous sticks. "How do you know about magic?" Harry asked, the stick in his hand trained on Jaden's chest.
The former Slifer Red duelist rolled his eyes, activating his duel disk. He wasn't going to get into this conversation without being prepared for things to go south. When he replied, it was with his most placating tone. He really didn't want to fight these guys. "It's obvious to anyone who can sense it. Plus, not a lot of people can just vanish into thin air without it. Let's try this again. Who are you guys?" He asked slowly, clearly. He just wanted answers. Not to get into a magical duel or something.
Harry frowned. "I told you, I'm Harry Potter. My friends over there are Hermione, and Ron." He nodded to the bushy haired girl and the ginger boy that hadn't said anything yet.
Jaden shook his head and smiled apologetically. "Sorry, those names don't mean anything to me. Gonna have to be a bit more specific. I'm Jaden Yuki. That doesn't mean anything to you either. But this might, I'm the Herald of the Gentle Darkness." He glanced over at the girl, Hermione. At his words she'd gasped, and was now staring at him with wide eyes. Her expression clearly meant she knew what he was talking about. Though he didn't know how she knew. Very few people did. It might have been written down in some ancient book somewhere. But where would she get one of those? He grinned at her regardless. "See, now we're making progress! She get's it." He motioned to her with the arm that didn't hold his duel disk.
Hermione shook her head in disbelief. "But, that's not possible. The Herald was prophesied to-" To her annoyance, Jaden cut her off with a cheeky grin. She shot him a disapproving look. Considering Jaden hadn't taken any hostile actions. She was more inclined to believe he was harmless, at least, to them he was. Even so, she had no patience for people who interrupted her.
"Defeat the Light of Destruction? Yeah, been there, done that. Prophecies are so two years ago. So, how do a couple of non-duelists like yourselves get info like that anyway?" He asked curiously, lowering his duel disk. He tilted his head to the side, trying to come up with a solution on his own. But coming up with nothing. Thinking outside of a duel was not his strong suit. Any one of his friends could testify to that.
Right now the biggest question was, where were these guys getting their information? Clearly they weren't gonna attack him if he wasn't gonna attack him. So that meant they weren't evil. So they must be the good guys. But that begged the question, who were the bad guys? Normally it was evil duelists. But there weren't any duelists here besides him.
"That's none of your business." The Ginger, Ron, said just a bit too quickly. That meant they were hiding something. From the way Ron had reacted, Jaden could guess it was something big. Maybe even life threatening. But whether it was life threatening to him, or them. He just didn't know. He'd ask, but he'd rather know how they knew about him. Or at least, how they knew about the past him. The Supreme King, the Herald of the Gentle Darkness, Haou.
Jaden smirked, crossing his arms smugly. "Well, I'm making it my business." He wasn't going to give up. This was big, he could feel it. Whatever they were doing, it could affect all of europe for all he knew! And since Duel Monsters wasn't involved, it was either more, or less dangerous than what he was used to dealing with.
"Don't think it works that way, mate." Harry shook his head. Probably determined not to tell him anything. People with secrets tended to want to keep them secrets. So he'd just have to make a guess. A wild one, and hope he guessed right. Though even if he guessed wrong, maybe his guess would shock them into correcting him. It'd happened before. Once or twice, though with people way less smart than these three were. His plan would probably fail miserably. But it'd be fun to guess anyway.
He smirked. "Does now! So Spill, what's the big secret? No wait, let me guess. Sticks, magic, Oh! Are you guys wizards, uh, and a witch? I bet that's it! I mean I didn't know those were still around. But it makes sense. That's so cool!" Jaden started rambling. To his surprise, the trio gave him shocked looks. As if they couldn't believe he'd guessed it in one go. He paused, wait they were really wizards and a witch? That was insane! He'd never have guessed in a million years that real live witches and wizards were still around. Because he couldn't go prolonged periods of time without thinking about his all time favorite game. He blurted his next through without any sort of restraint. "Dude I bet you guys would be great duelists! People with magic powers always make awesome duelists!" He declared excitedly, mentally plotting a way to get them decks and a rule book. They so had to learn to duel. He bet they'd love it!
Harry rolled his eyes at Jaden's outburst. Ron and Hermione simply looked confused. Ron, clearly had no idea what Jaden was talking about. Whereas Hermione was more confused about what he'd said. Rather than not knowing what he was saying in the first place. "That game there's always playing on Television? What's that got to do with anything?" She asked in confusion, her wand arm hanging at her side. She'd seen some of the televised tournaments. But hadn't thought much of the game.
Jaden stared at her like she'd just asked who Yugi Motou was. He waved his arms around to emphasize his next words. "Everything! Duel Monsters has everything to do with everything. The very fate of the world hinges on Duel Monsters all the time. It's a super magical and crazy dangerous game. But it's the best game ever so usually that doesn't stop anyone from playing." He was rambling. But there was only so much Duel Monsters ignorance he could take before it started to get freaky. He hadn't thought that there were people who didn't know about the game. It was such a big deal in japan. He had a lot of trouble adjusting to Duel Monsters far less popular nature in other countries.
Harry sighed and interjected into their conversation. "Can we get back on topic please?" He asked, motioning for them to get on with it. There were still a lot of questions to be answered. And the less time Jaden spent talking about his favorite game, the faster those answers would come. This day was definitely one of the stranger ones they'd had since going on the run. Though it didn't quite compare to any of the stuff they'd done at Hogwarts. Harry really doubted that anything could compare to their adventures there.
Jaden blinked. Taking a moment to regain his composure before smirking. "Sure thing. I'm not gonna go digging into your guys business though. So nothing to worry about there. You just go on with whatever epic quest to save the world I bet you're on." He said, waving them off. He was pretty much just wasting time here anyway. He'd have to move double time to make it to Venice before the Masked Guy. Even if it was pretty unlikely that he'd make it there in time at all.
Ron raised an eyebrow. "Why do you think we're on some kind of quest?" It was a pretty bold assumption to make. Even from a guy as weird as Jaden was. For all Jaden knew they were the bad guys. Yet somehow he seemed to be perfectly aware of the fact that they were the good guys in their story. No matter how that story ended, or who was telling it. At least that meant that Jaden had a good judge of character and moral compass. But threat to them or not, Jaden could still be a bad guy. They just didn't know enough about him.
"Eh, it just made sense. Campsites, magic, your collective super-paranoia. Just screams 'Fate of the world stuff'. Ya know?" Jaden shrugged. Most people who knew him would be surprised at his deductive skills. But he'd just remind them that he'd actually matured over the years of insanity at Duel Academy. And definitely wasn't the same Duel-Crazy Freshmen he'd started out as. He was getting there, but he'd probably never be that happy go lucky kid ever again. He'd seen just way too much stuff to go back to being the kid who laughed when he was losing duels and didn't take a situation seriously ever.
Ron shook his head. This guy was just full of surprises. "Not really. But, At least you're not a threat. Means we can stick around here another couple of hours." They did promise Hermione they'd do a little sight seeing, or at least try to find a newspaper so they weren't so out of the loop on current events. It was hard to keep up while on the run from a government lead by your best friends worst enemy. They'd managed remarkably well though.
Jaden glanced off to the side, as Yubel appeared. Only visible to him. She spoke, and as usual, it was something that you couldn't ignore. "You should warn your new friends that there are magical signatures approaching. Armed with Sticks instead of Duel Disks." She informed him in an almost bored tone of voice. As if she couldn't really be bothered to care about the issue, but still felt the need to bring it up. Truthfully, she was just a tad bit annoyed that Jaden had taken such a long detour. They could have been in Venice by now if he hadn't stopped to help out every town with an evil duelist they'd passed through.
"Actually, you guys better scram. Lucky that you're already packed up." He said, turning back to the trio briefly. He glanced off in the direction Yubel was pointing him towards. Holding up his duel disk suspiciously. Jaden wasn't a pushover. Magic Wands weren't a whole lot compared to his deck. He got the feeling it was important that Harry and his friends not get spotted though. They gave of the impression of being, very very important people in whatever task they were doing.
Hermione and Ron traded looks of confusion. Harry frowned in puzzlement, but seemed more willing to just take his word for it then his friends. "Why do we have to leave?" Harry asked, looking around and tensing in a paranoid manner. Though he was curious as to what Jaden had seen when he looked off to the side. It was probably not that big of a deal.
Jaden pulled a scrap of paper from inside his jacket pocket, and a pencil. He scribbled down his cell phone number and thrust it into Harry's hands."People are coming, Wizard people. Guessing they're not on your side. So you might as well get out of here before they find you. I can hold em' off for ya." He explained. They probably didn't have much time before the bad guys showed up. So he'd prefer if Harry and his friends got out of there quickly. Before things took a turn for the insane.
"What can you possibly do against Wizards?" Hermione frowned. Somehow she couldn't bring herself to doubt Jaden's words. The same sense of 'he's a trustworthy guy' that Harry had gotten earlier having overtaken her by now. She was slightly worried that he wouldn't be able to handle himself against Death Eaters. There was a big difference between Wizards and Duelists after all. Though the amount of Confidence Jaden had. Begged the question of, just how magical was Duel Monsters in the first place? She made a mental note to do some research on the card game after the war.
Jaden smirked, drawing a card from his duel disk. "You'd be surprised. Now hurry. I've got this. And, just gimme a ring if you ever need some Duelist Backup." He nodded towards the paper he'd given Harry. Though he wasn't sure if they actually had phones on them. That's what payphones were for. He'd just have to keep and eye on his caller I.D. Hopefully they'd actually call him. Rather than just run into him randomly again. He was always ready to help out guys in similar situations to him.
Ron shook his head in exasperation. "We're not in the position to turn down help. Come on guys." He walked over to stand between Harry and Hermione. The Trio linked hands and prepared to apparate to their next, pre-planned destination. They'd wasted enough time asking Jaden if he'd be okay. Clearly the older teen knew what he was doing. So they had nothing to worry about.
Harry nodded in agreement. He turned back to Jaden briefly. "Nice meeting you, Jaden." He grinned. Listening to Jaden go on about Duel Monsters had been a nice distraction from the Horcrux Hunt. Though now it would be back to business as usual. Hopefully they'd survive another couple of weeks before the Locket started screwing things up again. Maybe they should just store it in one of their bags permanently or something.
To their surprise, Jaden burst out laughing. He smiled at them brightly. "Don't say it like it's a goodbye. Trust me, we'll run into each other again. Seeya soon!" He declared, pointing at them with his middle and pointer finger. His signature goodbye, as they Apparated away.